I should also add that Harold Johnson of Coopers Landing, Alaska was pretty much the originator of the .50 Alaskan. His rifle of choice was the M71 Winchester or M86, re-barreled and chambered. They kept pressures down in the mid 40,000CUP range for the lever gun but still approached 2,000fps with 500gr.

Harold's favorite bullet for brown bears was a .50 Browning 750gr. steel core bullet, nose cut off, to 450gr. weight, then seated upside down over the powder, so the 'cupped' base became the nose. It is written that Harold never recovered a bullet from a bear - all exited the bear, although that cup-pointed 'solid' produced impressive cavitation and damage to the bear's innards. the bullet looked like a modern truncated cone, but with a short hollowed point or cup-point.

Although FPE, bullet weight and velocities were almost identical to the .450 Alaskan, the effect on bears showed a LOT more effectiveness for the .50 cal. version over the .45 version. Just a bit of history to help, I hope.